Robots Take Over for Verdi

Scientists at MIT are about to produce the world's first robotic opera. "Death and the Powers," now in rehearsal at the school's media lab, is a story about an inventor who wants to live forever and decides to download himself into his household belongings. The opera features an animatronic set, robotic performers and live musicians using "hyperinstruments"—traditional instruments imbedded with chips that interpret and enhance a performer's emotional emphasis. Singers may even use swallowable microchips that will change the way they sound.

Created by Tod Machover, an MIT-based composer who grew up with an engineer father and a pianist mother, the show boasts big-name talent. The librettist is former U.S. poet laureate Robert Pinsky and the lead will be sung by James Maddalena, who sung the part of Nixon in the celebrated opera "Nixon in China." The show is funded by Prince Albert II of Monaco. The show will open in Monaco next year before a U.S. tour. Machover says his aim is to use futuristic technology to make music more accessible. But he also wants an opera that's still about family, mortality and the meaning of life. By the ending, there may not be a dry monitor in the house.

© 2008